Wednesday, March 24, 2010

This place is a classic in my home state. It's made of beautiful stone work and has a very striking architechure. It was the first state funded tuberculosis sanatorium, and later became a state hospital and in 1965 became a reform school for boys. It's located on an active campus in the middle of nowhere. Very cool place overall and well worth the trip!

Thursday, March 18, 2010

I was in the area, so I checked out an abandoned coal-based power facility. It was pretty tough to shoot do to the heavy rain, lack of lighting, and my overall lack of experience shooting an industrial location, but all in all I had a good time here and wrapped things up rather quickly. I'm assuming the closure was sometime in the late 80's.

Monday, March 15, 2010

A fantastic location that looks out over the waters of the Patapsco River and the Chesapeake Bay. Has an absolutely amazing view, but I wish it was in better condition. This is a very common place in our region so its had PLENTY of visitors, and unfortunately they didn't treat it with the same respect.

On the base there are huge & beautiful empty houses on location that I'm sure could be worth a fortune. They were Army officer’s homes in the early 1900s, when the place was originally an Army fort. There are other unused World War One Era Army buildings there in various states of decay. There is beautiful, spacious open ground all around there.

I definitely wouldn't mind checking out the rest of the buildings in the near future either..

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

This place is one of the oldest psychiatric hospital's in the United States. It was constructed in the late 1700's. This place has a very rich history is absolutely amazing to explore!

It's filled with mounds of asbestos and lead hazards, but with a P100 mask or better you're good to go. I spent about 3 hours in here and went without a tripod to shoot. Needless to say I had a blast and found some fantastic treasures in here. It's located on an active campus and heavily patrolled by OMH, daily.

Not a single mark of graffiti or vandalism in this place. Gotta love it!

Monday, March 8, 2010

This youth detention center is located on a hilltop in the suburbs of Baltimore next to a brand new and active facility. I was greeted with trails of fresh blood (deer blood, I believe) in the snow on my way up and I heard; people talking, trucks driving by, and actually had somebody walk into one of the buildings I was exploring. So after a few "rambo mode" moments hiding in the woodline & jumping into a closet in the admin building, I continued on. This place has a rich history and both of the buildings I visited this day were essentially left as-is from the day it closed. One room was FILLED with trash bags full of inmates clothing. Untouched for several years...

I didn't get to visit all the buildings on this property so this is still a work in progress. I had a great time here and will be back in the very near future. Hopefully there will be a little less traffic coming in and out of there too.

Oh and I was approached by a pretty upset donkey while making my way back into the woodline. *shrugs*

Saturday, March 6, 2010

This place was very intriguing to me from the outside. It looked as though it was untouched for over 15 years or so. It was in a forgotten corner of a active campus, so I wanted to check it out. Upon entering I could see that metal/copper scrappers (probably legal ones) had done a number to almost all of the rooms. Not much left to see.

This place had several different floors that housed a series of different types of patients. One floor was a minimum security holding area, another for adolescent youth, a search and seizure lock-down floor and psychology unit on the top floor. It seemed that the higher I went up the less damaged the building was. The basement was really odd, but kind of cool.

Friday, March 5, 2010

This place just shut down in 2009 shortly after Maya Angelou paid a visit to the facility in May. So it looks pretty much the same way that it did while it was in operation. All the lights were still on, A/C was on FULL BLAST (it was freezing in the buildings), and even the football field scoreboard was lit up! Excellent waste of tax money...

This was a youth detention center for teenagers awaiting trial in Washington DC - it was infamous for shady teachers, escaped inmates, and poor living conditions. A new active site is right up the road, leaving this place ripe for exploring..

Thursday, March 4, 2010

This abandoned mental hospital was notorious for its poor conditions and abuse of patients. It opened its doors in 1925, and was shut down in 1991 by a federal court. There have since been numerous civil and class-action lawsuits involving patients and employees of this place.

During the early years, ______ _____ was considered a "state of the art" facility. With a good reputation this hospital set the standard for other states to follow. With declining conditions decades later many patients filed lawsuits against the hospital for reasons of abuse, neglect, poor living conditions... even medical testing. A small morgue was all that stood between the patients and a cemetery on site where graves have been repeatedly uncovered by erosion.

This is another place that looks like one day the staff just "disappeared" and left it as-is! It is filled with creepy vibes (some more so than others) and is an overall excellent place to explore. It is a CLASSIC in my home state! I've been twice now and have only seen about half of the buildings, so this is still a work in progress... Enjoy!